Cook Children's treats 5 kids with gunshot wounds in one week

FORT WORTH - An ER doctor in Fort Worth is speaking out after seeing five children with gunshot wounds in one week.

Cook Children’s Medical Center says they normally see two children with accidental gunshot wounds every month. But in just one week, ER doctors treated five children. And for some of the kids, their lives will never be the same.

Dr. Corwin Warmink is the Emergency Center Director for Cook Children’s. He says he’s frustrated after he and his staff treated five children between 3 and 11 years old from gunshot wounds in just one week.

“One hundred percent of these gunshot wounds could have been avoided if someone was properly monitoring their children,” he said.

One accidental shooting happened Last Friday in the parking lot of a Chuck E. Cheese in Fort Worth. Police say two 3-year-old boys went to their SUV ahead of their parents. When they boys opened the door, a pistol either fell out or was in the side compartment.

One of the boys accidentally shot himself in the hand, and the same bullet hit the other child in the back. Police say he has a long road of recovery ahead.

Just the day before that at the Chestnut Ridge Apartments in East Fort Worth, police say a 5-year-old found a gun on a dresser and shot himself in the hand.

"If you tell a parent, ‘Don't let your child run with scissors,’ they would agree 100 percent,” Warmink said. “Sometimes, they forget there is a handgun or lethal weapon within arm's reach of the child. With a gunshot wound, there's no second chance."

Dr. Warmink said even if the physical injuries heal, there is an emotional toll the shootings take.